I Am The Enemy You Killed, Brother
Abdulramah Misturah
The sky was unpleasantly gloomy as if it’ll rain all night, the wind blew cold and dust, it whistled in a rhythm like it was passing a message. The doors of the cell clang and you could hear the warders wanting to close the windows of their offices and get their uniforms off the drying lines. The random noises from other cells is also an embodiment that evoked such an atmosphere of worriedness and disorderliness.
There, in cell 194. It was different from what the prison was. Only the graveyard could match the level of lifelessness. Everyone sat staring either at the broken ceiling, the dusty ground or through the clanging gates. Until Akin stood and walked to the gates, he looked to his left then right as if he wanted to do the Micheal Scofield of a thing. He leaned on the gates and let out a soliloquy “life tuff, wetin…” You wan make I fuck your yansh? A think voice from his cell cut his soliloquizing short and others bursted into laughter. That was when Akin realised that his position attracts such remark, though he has never being a victim but he heard a lot of news about guys raping his fellow gender.Unbothered, he hissed and stared straight into the opposite cell and started his soliloquy again “omo, how did I get here? What have I done? If only I had followed the teachings of my mother, if I hadn’t let the devil use me. He bursted in tears, rest in peace mom, it isn’t your fault, you did what a good mother should have done.Despite that you were a single mother, you taught me and my elder brother the way of God and how to be a better person. You took us away from the path of our father whom you said might influence us into hooliganism because he was the Eleniyan of idi ìlépa. You nursed us to live a different life from his. It was when you got sick…there was an alarming strike of thunder that placed the prison into an higher state of commotion.
It was when you got sick, mother. When myself and Bayo had to hawk to get your drugs and feed ourselves. That moment was truly a dark one. I noticed Bayo started moving with Skido and Razor, the boys you warned us against. He bought your drugs and fed us without hawking. He started buying expensive things, he once came home with an iPhone 13pro max. I challenged him and he took a picture of me in the process, well I posted it on my Facebook and I had a lot of likes.
I couldn’t take it anymore, I confronted him about his source of provision. He confessed he has been involved in some stealing with Skido and their gang. I was so mad at him but he kept telling me “poverty is enemy and we have to kill it.
Poverty is the enemy and we have to kill it, With time, I joined them. We went from picking pockets to snatching till we became petty robbers. We soon graduated into armed robbers.And everytime I tried to stop Bayo, he’d remind me ” poverty is the enemy and we have to kill it.
Until we went on a mission, unknowingly it’d be our last. We were armed and stuffed with ammunitions and different charms. We planned to rob three banks, unfortunately we were caught in the act by the police and we had to open fire, it was during this course that Bayo was shot in the head, he died immediately. Skido and many others also died. Only few was arrested injured and we were charged for murder, armed robbery, impersonation and assault on the police. We were sentenced to death by hanging.
Mtcheeew, he hissed out loudly that his fellow cell mates had to pay attention to him …omoooo!!! He continued, so I just have three more days to live, I’m the enemy you killed, brother.
